TPC Romance Week, Guest Post #4: Facets of Love

Today I bring to you a story, I believe the first of the TPC Romance Week, penned by fellow-blogger and contributor at Candles Online, Dr. Anupan Dey, who blogs at Anupam’s Serenity.

I have no idea if this is from his own experience or not, but incidents like the one he has described are seen and heard enough in our sometimes sad, bitter world. But this story shows you how love can exist in different forms – the very reason why I started this week.

Enjoy the story!

“Trrinnnggg……Trrinnnggg….” my landline phone bellowed, shattering the stillness of the sublime and not so young, night.

I had just returned home, after walking my 4-year-old Labrador, Bruno, and the amplified ring of a typical Indian landline phone stopped me in my tracks. It got me thinking that whoever is calling, wants me to pick up and talk. Otherwise, why would someone call me on the landline phone, disregarding the comforts of a Whatsapp message that can get me to react faster?

My Wife came out rushing from the kitchen and halted my reverie. “Why can’t you pick up that godforsaken phone?” she asked in an almost sarcastic tone.

“She is right,” I thought. One more ring and my one-year-old daughter, Abigail, sleeping in the bedroom, would wake up. So I rushed to pick up the phone hurriedly, almost breathlessly saying, “Hello! Hello!” as Bruno watched me in silence.

There was a silence that took ages I thought.

The female voice on the other side then almost gasped to say, “Hello, Sir! I am calling from Casuality. A burn patient has come and we would want you to come and see her.” On further enquiry, I got to know that the burnt girl was almost 60% burnt and would require immediate intervention.

The news sank me and my wife to the depths of depression. We were almost getting ready after ages to cook together a pot of Biriyani and eat it with almost sinful desire with candle lights to give us company but alas, with a new patient coming, I now had to make that long and arduous 4-kilometre walk to the hospital and the idea was simply irritating to me as well as to my wife.

She is a very good cook and had been preparing the spices since morning. Love was in the air, this being the season of love and we love birds were looking to re-ignite our love. Life, for a Surgeon, in this 300 bedded Mission Hospital, located in a sleepy hollow called Bissamcuttack, in the forests of Eastern Ghats of India, was not only unrespiteful but unforgiving as well.

“Your patients are always getting in the way of our love. Keep counting how many hours you spend with me,” my wife retorted.

I knew this was coming. There was nothing more that I could say. She was, in a way right, and my guilty conscience was simply unforgiving. All I could say with a sullen face was that we will do this tomorrow. She felt bad no doubt, but still smiled childishly to say, “okay”. I walked out with that straw of assurance that love was still stronger than the anger that diverts it.

The patient in Casuality was an ultimate mess. 60% flame burns, quite deep in nature, was looking very bad. She was an 18-year-old girl studying in class 12th. Her parents were inconsolable and cursing her. Her father, quite unforgivingly, told me, “Look what happens, when you have a girl child; boys are so much better”. Rather than talking about treatment schedule, he had almost turned this into a battle of the sexes.

I felt disgruntled at this typical Indian mindset. Being a father to a cute and lovely daughter, this came as a swift slap.

In an angry tone I asked him as to how this happened. What he said almost blew my brains off. He said, almost unforgivingly, “We loved our daughter but she didn’t love us, the very reason why she was found roaming with a boy in college. That is why we took matters in our own hands and punished her. Accidentally, she got burned more than we thought she would”.

It was almost unbelievable!

I made sure that the Police were called and the parents put behind bars. Work started on the girl. To save her would be difficult but we started her on antibiotics, IV fluids and dressed her wounds. She was promptly incubated due to low oxygen saturation and the ventilator took over the breathing work. I felt bad for her. All she did was spend some quality time with a good friend. Her Haemoglobin came to be 6 gm% , so we promptly transfused one unit of blood too.

Her survival will now depend on a whole lot of factors. God only will be able to tell that. I heaved a sigh of relief, standing outside Casuality. A job well done is so satisfying.

A sudden glance at my watch told me that’s it was almost 11 o’clock. I walked back home, getting mentally ready to hear whatever my wife would dish out, for coming home late.

Bruno, my dog, recognised my footsteps immediately and my wife was ready with a glass of water. “Wash up,” she said, “I am serving dinner”. When I came back to the dinning table after freshening up, I found the candlelights burning brightly, the lights having been dimmed and hot, mouth-watering Biriyani on the plates.

“I thought we cancelled,” I said.

All she had to say was, “For the game called Love, this much was nothing,” and smiled amazingly.

We ate in utter blissfulness and I wondered, here were two facets of love that I saw –

A love that was patient, kind, understanding and another that prompted anger and destruction.

Sometimes I feel we should take pains to give love a chance, exactly like my wife did. That is the true Valentine Love . Most often our love is lesser than our egos, and when we walk that path, we end up suffering.